As planned, this morning I managed to get out on the bike to do a bit of a recce on part of the route we’ll be taking on Wednesday. I’d planned a 40 mile loop that would include about 18 miles of the London to Paris route.

You wouldn’t necessarily expect to find my country roads in around London but the road out of Addington is exactly that. It’s a narrow, winding road that climbs up to Farthing Street and around the back of Biggin Hill. The narrow nature of the road can make it difficult for cyclists as there is little passing distance, even cars going in opposite directions cannot pass each other. I sat in behind 3 fellas who were on their way out to Eastbourne then turning back for Tunbridge Wells, the easy pace suited me fine!

The road opens out a bit after that and it was certainly one for the puncheurs as the continual low gradient climb was perforated by rolling terrain. I’m pretty used to this area as it isn’t far from my usual routes so thankfully I’ve had a lot of practice! The timelapse below shows the L2P part of my route today

As with every ride, I have to get home and that means a pretty big hill to get up. The easiest is probably the Clarks Lane way from Westerham into Warlingham but, even then, there’s the 7% 0.7 mile slog up Beggars Lane to deal with. Most cyclists don’t worry about this kind of thing but for a fat 40 year old it is a bit of a ballache at the end of a ride! If you can be bothered to watch, below is the a link to the easiest route for me to get back to Warlingham from Surrey or Kent